ROCKY RELATIONSHIP

The Rock Reveals What Caused His Final Falling Out With Wrestler Dad

The pair weren’t speaking when NWA Champion Rocky Johnson died in 2020.

The Rock is getting personal about his strained relationship with his late father, Rocky Johnson. In a new interview with The New York Times Magazine, Dwayne Johnson, 53, revealed that an argument over Rocky’s 2019 memoir, Soulman: The Rocky Johnson Story, dealt the final blow to their relationship, leading the pair to stop speaking for months before his father’s 2020 death. According to Johnson, the book contained a series of quotes, written by his father but falsely attributed to him, that implied he credited Rocky with all of his career success. The Jungle Cruise star was even credited as the author of the book’s foreword, even though he hadn’t written a word. “It just completely crossed the line,” Johnson told the Times. He called the incident an example of his father’s “narcissism.” When Johnson confronted his father about the false quotes, he said Rocky denied any wrongdoing and refused to correct the mistake. The pair never spoke again, and Johnson learned of his father’s death while filming Red Notice in Georgia the following year. However, the Smashing Machine star says he’s since made peace with Rocky’s actions. “I think my dad’s capacity to love was very limited,” he told the Times. “He was kicked out when he was 13. Imagine that pain. And that’s the man who raised me. That was my dad.”